Raman defends patchy Gambhir

With two straight ducks on the trot, Kolkata skipper Gautam Gambhir is in the midst of a lean form off-late. With the tournament still at an early stage, the team management is however not too worried over the lack of runs from their skipper.

Speaking to the T20 league's official website, W V Raman, the batting coach of the Kolkata franchise said Gambhir is just one good innings away from striking form. Gautam Gambhir is just one knock away from striking form, Raman said. He is too good a player to allow this to happen for too long. Hopefully, he will get going sooner rather than later and once he gets going, you know what he is capable of. You know what has happened as far as results are concerned for KKR when he has got going. We are hoping that he will find his rhythm quickly.

Kolkata started well with a convincing victory over Mumbai in their first match, but slipped up towards the end stages to lose their second match against Delhi. Raman, though was looking into the positives from the match. "We would like to look at the positives out of that game. We were in a tight situation in that game while batting, but we got out of it and posted a good score. The good thing about the team is that the guys are there to put their hands up and be counted," he said.

Kolkata meet the high-flying Bangalore side in their next match at Sharjah and the batting coach knows the task is cut out for his bowlers - who will come up against perhaps the best batting team of the tournament. We have our plans in place, but at the end of the day, it will all come down to the execution of those plans on the field. The pitch out here is fully in favour of the batsmen and it depends what happens on the given day during a tight situation. Despite being a small ground, it can work in the bowlers favour sometimes. We did see quite a few catches going down, but eventually, it is about being there and keeping a positive frame of mind," he signed off.

Kolkata Knight Riders' victory celebrations post their triumphant Indian Premier League (IPL) campaign were marred by a near-stampede followed by a lathi-charge as more than 150,000 supported clambered over barricades and gates to get a glimpse of their heroes.